RUMOUR HAS IT – EPISODE 10

When you see Olarinde for the first time you won’t really think much of him. Save the fact that you are looking at a quiet unassuming teenager with glasses, there isn’t much to Olarinde. His glasses have always been his saving grace against his mother’s disapproval of everything about him. His mother is one of those backward Nigerians who think people who wear glasses are intelligent and have a mystery around them. She is always eager to tell whoever cares to know that he began to wear glasses after ruining his eyes from over reading.

‘He can read at any time of the day even at night when you enter his room he is reading.’ Yeye would proudly declare, she sees nothing wrong with Olarinde’s reading. If only she knew that what Olarinde reads goes beyond science textbooks.

Olarinde walked briskly towards the junction that was described in the text message. He squinted as a car flashed it powerful headlights, dressed in a light blue hoodie with jeans and sneakers he looked like every teenager in Wellington estate. He spotted the car from a distance and increased his pace. The car drove away from the estate the moment he entered.

‘Have you deleted the text?’ The driver asked.

‘Yes’ Olarinde murmured. He plugged in his earpiece after answering. The driver was someone of little words and so was he. He closed his eyes and drifted. The nightmare of the previous night came again. He was standing in a big room with lots of doors, the lights were turned off and the smell of rot pervades the air. He walked slowly around the room and didn’t know which door to open first. His hands as if guided by something took him to the sixth door, careful not to make a sound he turned the knob. He began to hear a gboom gboom gboom sound the moment the door opened a little. The faint outline of someone appeared, the person was pounding something inside a mortar with a pestle. He walked inside and as he moved closer, the smell of painful death hit his nose. The person pounding paused and opened a pot and began to pick different items from the pot into the mortar. Olarinde saw infant head, arms getting dropped inside the mortar. He looked on in alarm as the person began to pound, bones crushed, flesh bowed to pressure and it all turned into a gory mix. He clutched his throat for his scream was stuck there then the pounding stopped and the person pounding looked at him. Olarinde saw the familiar strong jaw and wide nostrils …

‘We are there’ the driver’s words woke Olarinde from his troubled sleep. It took him some minutes before he remembered where he was. Then he calmly got out of the car and followed the driver into the hut.

There are some things money cannot buy and there are some things money cannot change. Class is the first and bad habit is the second. Yeye lacked the first and the second comes in excess for her. She loves money too much, flamboyant pieces, gaudy jewellery, loud makeup and flashy cars. Pepper them to fire them is her favourite catchphrase as meaningless as it sounds.

She would rather spend her time buying unnecessary items than care about her children moral wellbeing. She doesn’t seem to mind if her children go out of line for kids would be kids and her’s are no ordinary kids they are Coker kids. Despite being a deaconness in her church Yeye still find it hard to let old bad habits die. She instead became more discreet in her dealings. So when Seun had requested they have to see and talk Yeye didn’t say no even though she knew what it meant. Yeye had gone on her own refusing to allow the two drivers to drive her. She drove herself to the house that was described to her and was ushered in by Seun.

Seun joked about the Otunba being responsible for Yeye’s good looks, a joke Yeye angrily waved aside. She was still hurt that her husband could do something that severe and refuse to call her to apologize or better still come home to her to apologize. She nervously nibbled at her nails, the first bad habit she ever formed and took the drink Seun offered without saying thank you.

‘Omolewa you know it is uncouth when you are served a drink and you withhold your thank you’ Seun stared down at Yeye.

‘Sorry’ Yeye mumbled ‘thanks’ she said with a glare and downed the drinks. ‘More?’ Seun asked with an evil grin Yeye nodded and took another one and then another until she let Seun hold her without protest and guide her into the room. When all was done Yeye stumbled into the bathroom to throw up and then wash herself. She returned back to the room and saw Seun sprawled on the bed the evil grin still plastered on her ever young face.

‘Why are you looking furious like you were not pleased with it? I know you have missed me’ Seun stood up from the bed not minding to take a cloth to wrap herself. Yeye looked at her in disgust but Seun doesn’t care she went to hold Yeye who took a step back, Seun puzzled placed a soft hand on Yeye’s cheek and cooed ‘What is it?’

‘I told you Seun times without number that I can’t be seen doing this‘ Yeye spoke stiffly.

‘But you keep coming back’ Seun said with an innocent expression on her face then she looked bemused. ‘Come on Omolewa! It’s just good old fun nothing hurts nobody’ Seun sang.

‘Well, I have a family and a reputation how about that?’ Yeye asked as her nose flared.

‘How about that? How about that?’ Seun mimicked with an annoying childlike voice then she became serious ‘listen woman, you are responsible for whatever happens to your family family woman. I warned you didn’t I? I told you not to but you did anyway. I guess he has something I don’t have!’ Seun scoffed.

‘Yes he does!’ Yeye shouted ‘and he gave me kids with that! I don’t blame you, you can’t know how it feels because you don’t have any. How about that!’ Yeye snatched her purse and shoes from the floor and stormed out of the room leaving Seun bewildered.

Yeye flung her things in the backseat when she got outside. As she entered her car she vowed never to answer any of Seun’s calls again, she should do her worst. Yeye thought as she maneouvered her car out of the house.

Evil Eye laughed so hard that tears spilled. ‘Foolish woman, you will fall so hard that your big behind won’t be enough to cushion the effect, how about that?’ Evil Eye said to no one in particular before dialling a number on the cellphone.